The Chronicles of the Castle on a Rock - Lyunika the Beginning

Di Patricia O'Mahony

A strange destiny awaits the young Knight Hospitaller Sir Geoffrey De Mortimer. Under the protection of Lyunika, Custodian of the Castle on a Rock, he embarks on time travel quests, needing courage, trust and sacrifice

• Lingua: Italiano
• Editore: Youcanprint
• Data di uscita: 20 feb 2024
• ISBN: 9791222715933

Anteprima del libro

Parchment

1

Although destroyed by the Anglo/Italian fleet in 1809 commanded by Sir John Stuart, the ruins of the Cathedral still echo the splendour of the ceremonies which were held here."

The guide's voice chanted on, how many times had he heard those sentences repeated to crowds of bored, hot uninterested tourists. Today it was the turn of a large group of English tourists doing the ‘Day Trip' of the island.

It never ceased to amaze him how a whole group of people, each individual in their own sense, could all manage to look exactly the same. All dressed in their especially bought chain shop holiday clothes, along with their obligatory walking sandals, they trundled through his Castle, paying their entrance fee and almost running through his home and gardens, stopping for the normal photo stops before rushing off to the next site, complaining there had been nothing much to see.

Nothing much to see!

So much had happened on his island Castle that it would take years and years of careful study to learn about everything that these walls had heard and these windows had seen. Here on this Rock Castle, history was still alive. This was a place oflegend, a palimpsest.

He wished that he could talk to these droves of happy holidaymakers, he could tell them the strangest tales that would make their hearts skip a beat, stories of the lives of hundreds and thousands of people who had lived and died in his home.

Kings and Queens, poets and musicians had all passed through its gates.

The Anglo/Italian fleet commanded by Sir John Stuart had destroyed his home in 1809, hadn't they heard the guide just tell them so?

During his years in the Castle, Geoffrey had witnessed many disasters, earthquakes, miracles, pirate attacks, but that day was still etched in his memory as freshly as if it had happened yesterday His home had then gradually fallen into ruin, families no longer lived within its walls and children no longer played along its battlements.

Instead for many years, the wails and screams of dying or tortured prisoners became the Castle's sad song.

The sumptuous feasts for the visiting dignitaries were now all past history, never again to be repeated. His home had become just another ruin to be visited on a two week holiday in the blazing Mediterranean sunshine.

In the summer evenings, the heavenly quiet of his Castle on the Rock had been interrupted by an infernal noise coming from the depths of the old armoury.

Not the hissing, rasping, roar of an angry wyvern but a tribal sort of chant, following loud animalistic music, attracting hundreds of holidaying youths, drawn like moths to a huge rotating beacon which shone skywards towards the heavens, illuminating the ink black night sky.

Like mutants they had swarmed down the bridge towards the throbbing light and blaring noise - people of the night, their faces painted with strange designs, wearing dark black clothes or riding infernally noisy two wheeled contraptions emitting not only an earth shattering noise but also black putrid smoke which floated up into the warm night, disturbing the nesting gulls and owls. He had watched these strange young men and women in wonder. Jumping up and down to the rhythm of repetitive drumming music until exhaustion overtook them and sitting on the bridge outside his Castle's gate, they would light small white tubes, place them in their mouths and inhale the stinking smoke. Strange customs he had thought.

The hot summer night was ripped apart by this music and chanting until thankfully dawn broke over the island of Capri and the screaming hoards quickly scurried back along the bridge to the shelter of their homes to sleep away the heat of the day, only to the return and repeat their actions the following evening.

Geoffrey stretched lazily and jumped down from the wide fork in the branch of the sturdy fig tree in the garden and silently made his way back up to the Solar to record the day's happenings in his Book of Records.

Gradually there was always less to record.

Less events to record in the enormous leather bound books which held the life of the Castle, throughout the centuries, within their gilt embossed leather covers.

He was tired, the enthusiasm he had had as a lad had finally left him.

The 21st century had won.

As was his wont, Sir Geoffrey's thoughts flew back to his early days in his beloved Castle, looking down on the village from his window seat in the Solar he reminisced.

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2

Awarm grey mist swirled around him enveloping everything. Soft grey tendrils clung to his soiled wet, dark brown heavy woollen cloak, and crept up the masts to caress the limp white sails of the galley, which was almost at a standstill, rolling and creaking gently in a smooth calm sea.

Sir Geoffrey de Mortimer, Knight Hospitaller, his crew and Lad, his beloved chestnut stallion, had set sail from the port of Acre in Palestine three weeks ago.

It was 23rd September in the Year of Our Lord 1189 and after eight years of ruthless battles and sufferance they were finally going home, leaving the torrid scorching intense heat of the Holy Land to return to the green fields of England. Young fresh faced, fair skinned inexperienced boys, brimming with enthusiasm when they had set out for the Crusades, they were returning as world weary sunburnt men, with long matted hair, bleached blonde by the sun, prematurely aged and depleted by the horrors of war.

Months before just outside the army's camp site, his horse's hooves had unearthed a weather-worn beige oilskin, halfburied in a sand dune.

It was tightly wrapped around an ancient ripped parchment scroll, and he had spent many nights studying the intricate Arabian lettering, at first comparing it to the Latin the monks had taught him and then devising his own alphabet.

The fragile scroll was dirty and dusty and appeared to have been snapped and torn in half horizontally but after careful cleaning, as he delicately unrolled the broken wooden handles, and it revealed the most beautiful chart ofthe skies he had ever seen. A large, silver blue, full moon had been painted in the centre, surrounded by constellations drawn as strange wonderful animals, long curling snakes and huge frightening monsters in brilliant shiny colours, dancing and weaving in a dark night sky but the most impressive of all was the emblem of a silvery, shining green wyvern designed at the beginning of the scroll.

Geoffrey diligently studied the chart and devoted all his spare time at trying to decipher the meaning of the chart, using the little Arabic that he had learnt and finally after weeks of study, he ascertained to his immense surprise, that he was translating a sea route to Europe.

Instead of a gruellingly long overland journey through Europe, he could return to England quicker, by sea!

He guessed that he had found a treasured Celestial Star Chart, maybe lost by a Captain of one of the Crusader's fleet. Each Capitan had his own secret chart and he had heard that they were highly prized. He couldn't believe his good fortune.

He had no problems convincing his exhausted fellow soldiers to follow this new route home and uniting their funds they bought a used small single sail wooden galley, which they fitted out for the journey as best they could.

In the beginning it had been really easy, the weather was perfect and fish were plentiful. Gentle sea breezes carried them across the waves and everyone relaxed thankful for their good fortune.

21 days and nights later, fighting heavy swelling, terrifying, foaming seas, struggling against strong currents and gale force winds that had threatened to pull them off course, they were exhausted and ready to give up all hope of ever seeing land again. Burning and sweating under a relentless blistering sun in the daytime and shivering from pouring freezing rain at night, they were weary and seasick.

Horrifyingly enormous whales, gigantic monsters they had never seen before in their lives, had surfaced close to the ship, spurting high fountains of water, before diving and disappearing deep beneath the waves, creating huge waves which almost capsized them, rocking their ship from side to side.

Slippery, silver grey, dolphins swam in front of the ship's bows, racing each other. A pair had even leapt out of the water, in a wide arch high in the air, passing perfectly over the ship's bows, teasing the frightened crew.

Looking over the ship's side, down into the depths of the transparent deep blue sea below them, Geoffrey imagined that he saw the form of a giant grey octopus, bigger than his ship, swimming below them and quickly gave orders to change course and be ready for action, but the monster passed them by diving deep down to the depths ofthe sea.

The Celestial Star Chart which had at first been easy to follow now seemed to have led them off course and they were adrift in a merciless, roaring sea, even the thousands of stars high above them were unfamiliar.

Farmers, blacksmiths and stone masons by trade, the constant rolling and pitching of the galley and the flapping of the sail had dulled their senses.

Last night, the tempest which had accompanied them for the whole voyage had suddenly subsided and the sea had become dead calm, nothing stirred, no land could be seen, just deep smooth black inky darkness, the only light was from the small yellow oil lantern on deck.

My Lord said Sebastian his page approaching him warily The men are hungry what are we to do? Stocks are almost finished, we have eaten all the dried and salted foods and the drinking water is almost finished too! No fish were caught yesterday the sea was too rough.

Cast more lines, there must be fish now, the sea is calm answered Sir Geoffreygoingbelow deck to check the store-room.

The salted meat jars stacked against the hull sides, were in fact all empty, he only found a small pack of dry ship's biscuits and one goat's skin still full of almost putrid drinking water, the now empty, fresh water barrels rolling noisily around.

Sebastian, call all hands on deck he ordered.

The weary crew assembled before him.

Men he addressed them, I speak plainly the situation is desperate, supplies have finished and unless we catch some fish,I fear that we only have our last small ration ofbiscuits this evening. We are in the hands of Our Lord.

Obediently but grumbling the men returned to their fishing lines, yet after many hours of patiently waiting for the fish to bite, caught nothing so after eating their final miserable ration of dried biscuits, they went below decks to sleep.

Geoffrey kept watch. He enjoyed keeping watch and looking at the hundreds of thousands of stars twinkling in the dark blue velvet sky. He had never seen such stars before in his homeland and noticed that every night two large stars seemed to be following or guiding them, or was